The Actions of Love
by hotblackcoffee
Summary: A fiction rather typical of me: Hannibal and Clarice are together. Are they happy?
1. Trying to Cope

This is the first thing I've written in a while and there's not much of a real plot, so just be patient with me. Thanks for reading.   
Emily  
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Clarice had been moody lately, something that was strange for her. She was usually so even-tempered and calm, but this was not the case as of late. She'd yelled at Hannibal for putting her glass in the kitchen sink when she wasn't finished with it; then she yelled at him for not washing the glass. She'd become irrational lately, and he was lost. Where had he gone wrong? What had happened between them in the past month? Even during her 'time of the month', Clarice was not this violent.   
  
Hannibal pondered over these things as he prepared himself for bed. Walking into the elegant bathroom that he and Clarice shared, he saw a blanket of glass shards on the floor. "Oh, no." Clarice had broken something else. He sighed. Hannibal left the bathroom and walked to the closet in the kitchen, where he gathered a dustpan and a small broom into his arms.   
  
On his way back to the bathroom, he heard a soft sound coming from his study. Hannibal stopped at the door to his study and listened for a moment before pushing the door open a bit more. He surveyed the room and noticed Clarice sitting on a small lounge that she particularly liked. She had her head in her hands and was crying quietly. Hannibal walked slowly into the study and silently sat the broom and dustpan on his desk. Clarice did not acknowledge his presence until he softly called, "Clarice?" She looked up at him with desperate longing in her eyes.   
  
Hannibal walked slowly toward Clarice, curious as to what could possibly be wrong. "Dearest, please tell me what's wrong."  
  
"I…I'm fine."   
  
"No, you're not fine. You will answer me truthfully, Clarice, or else." She sniffled.  
  
"Or else what?" she asked rather mockingly. He sighed heavily. There was no response he could give to her. "There's nothing you can do that could make me feel worse than I do."  
  
"Well," he said, scooting closer to her, "why is that, Clarice?" Her eyes were icy and distant. "Why do you feel so awful? Is it something that I have done? Have I offended you, dear?" This started a new flood of tears and he pulled a cotton handkerchief from his pocket, wiping her cheeks. "If you're not ready to talk about it, I understand." He waited for a moment more, giving her a chance to say something. She was silent. Hannibal sighed and stood up.   
  
Clarice Starling looked out the large window of Hannibal's study. She carefully considered the Arno River, the Ponte Vecchio, and all the people milling around the city. She longed to be there, away from the pressure of being wed to Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Only days ago they had talked about having a child together, something that Clarice did not want. First and foremost, she did not believe that she would be a good mother. Not even a mediocre mother. She didn't want a child to go through what she had gone through as a little girl, especially not her child.   
  
So engrossed in her thoughts, Clarice didn't even notice that Hannibal was gone. She felt strangely numb to everything. She felt as though she was in another world, a world where babies and pregnancy and husbands didn't exist.   
  
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So Chapter One is completed. I realize that this was a bad place to stop, but I wanted to group everything that's coming next into one chapter. 


	2. An Altercation

Despite the circumstances of their relationship, Hannibal prepared a meal for dinner as usual. Clarice couldn't help but be drawn to the kitchen when she smelled it, regardless of how angry she was. After all, she had to eat. Walking into the dining room, she saw two tall candlesticks burning on the table and found two place settings already laid out. The small flames of the two candles cast brilliant shadows on the dining room wall. She looked down at herself, bathed in a warm, golden glow and immediately felt safe.   
  
For some strange reason, she thought of Jack Crawford. Why, she didn't know; she hadn't thought of him in nearly two years. She wondered if he was healthy and living well. She hoped he was. Clarice decided that she would just have to call Jack someday, if only to check up on him. She wondered, too, if he ever thought of her or worried about her.   
  
Jack, Hannibal, Ardelia, babies, love, and life seemed to worry her immensely. Everything was on her mind lately and everything bothered her. Moodswings were commonplace now. She was not the Clarice Starling that Jack Crawford and Ardelia Mapp knew. She was someone else now.  
  
Hannibal Lecter stepped into the dining room, interrupting her thoughts. "Dinner will be served now," he said in a very flat tone. Clarice turned to face him, stared him straight in the eye, and began to walk out of the room. He blocked the doorway, and she tried to push past him. He realized that he had taken enough. He was quite tired of her little 'moodswings', and he was going to fix that right away.   
  
Before Clarice took another step, she felt herself thrown against the wall with such force that a vase on a nearby table fell to the floor, splashing her bare legs with water and glass. She gasped. "I think it wise for you not to toy with me, Clarice. You're a smart girl. You know that with one turn of my wrist I could kill you right now." He stared into her eyes, provoking tears. Still, she would not concede. Hannibal placed his hand around her neck. Clarice squeezed her eyes shut, anxious of what was to come next. She did not breathe for fear that a breath might only cause him to tighten his hand.   
  
"Let go of me," she managed to say.  
  
"No," came his quick reply. "You're being rather naughty tonight, Clarice, and not in the way that I'd prefer." She let out a deep sigh of disgust and opened her mouth to say something. "No, no, no. I do the talking, you do the listening, dear. Unless, of course, you have something to say."  
  
"You are being absolutely repulsive right now. Now let go of me!" She called up all of her strength and fought him away from her. He wrestled her to the floor and she found herself lying on top of the newly-broken vase. Feeling glass against her cheek, she winced in pain. Clarice refused to give up and kept fighting. She cried out in pain when one of the larger pieces of glass hit her abdomen. Tears of physical and emotional hurt filled her eyes as she tried desperately to get off of the glass.   
  
Most times, it would have taken a gunshot to the head or heart to stop Clarice from fighting, but she was hurt in many ways and found that she could not go on. Clarice allowed her body to go limp on the blood-stained carpet. Lecter realized that she was an opponent no longer, but a patient that needed immediate and gentle tending to. He stood up and pulled Clarice to a standing position, but realized that she was unable (or perhaps unwilling) to walk, so he picked her up.   
  
Lecter could see that Clarice was very obviously in pain and was bleeding severely. He did not have time to escort her to a couch or bed, so he pushed everything off the dining room table and placed her on it. She looked up at him curiously as she laid on the table, wondering if she was really bleeding that badly. She must have been to have him do something so improper as playing doctor on the table.   
  
Hannibal lifted her shirt and placed his hands on her stomach, making her flinch. Clarice noticed that his hands were soft and warm; very comforting. She decided not to object to his doings, seeing as she could have possibly bled to death without him there to rescue her. But, hadn't he been the one to put her in that position? Yes. He had. And now he was taking care of her. This man was more moody than she was. Hannibal pulled the glass out of Clarice's stomach as gently as he could, but even that could not keep her from screaming in pain. "Stop! Please," she begged, "just leave it there. Please! It hurts when you pull on it!" But he did not stop, he continued to pull on the small pieces of glass.  
  
Soon, they were all out and Clarice was crying uncontrollably. Hannibal wiped the blood from Clarice's soft, white skin and cleaned the cut with alcohol. "OW!" Clarice yelled. "That hurts! Stop it!" she screamed, louder than before. Finally, Clarice tired of yelling and fighting Hannibal and she let him nurse her stomach. He gently applied a bandage to her stomach and kissed it, then kissed each tear on her cheek. Clarice, however, was not moved. She was still violently angry, and probably would have fought him again if she had any strength at all.  
  
Dinner was very quiet that night. Clarice was still angry about the events that had taken place only several hours before. The only words exchanged between the two were "Please pass the wine," and, "May I have a napkin?" The silence was unbearable and made Clarice feel strange. Never had the two of them spent dinner in that manner. The evening meal was always a nice, enjoyable time for the couple to tell each other about their day.   
  
Clarice refused to look at Lecter, not wanting to see his eyes teasing her for crying so easily. Hannibal seemed to have no problem eating in silence, Clarice noticed. Finally, he spoke. "Clarice, I am sorry for dinner being served so late this evening. I offer my humblest apologies to you." Clarice rolled her eyes.   
  
"If it's late it's your fault," she said in a low whisper. He did not offer a reply.  
  
He looked as though he wouldn't even miss her if she excused herself, so she did. She cleared her throat and angrily threw her napkin on the plate that she'd hardly touched. Hannibal did not even look as she exited the dining room.   
  
Inhaling deeply, Clarice tried to keep her hands on the reins of the intense anger that leaked into her blood. She wanted nothing more than to scream loudly, letting all of her frustrations take wing to the sky, never to bother her again. But no, she would not give him the pleasure of knowing how angry she was. Clarice walked outside to the cool evening air of Florence. All at once, she felt a rush of every emotion known to man, some of which she had never felt before.   
  
Clarice had never once been confronted with motherhood; she'd never been married before. When the discussion on having children had come about earlier that week, Hannibal made it known that he wouldn't mind having a child; that perhaps he would rather like to have one. Clarice had said nothing that day to displease him. Seeing him cheerfully thinking about having a baby made her happy. At least he wasn't in a foul mood.   
  
Now, it was different. She wondered if he would be as violent with a baby around as he had been tonight. Clarice wasn't sure that she wanted to know. She was sure, however, that she did not want to carry his (or any other man's) child. Not now and not ever.  
  
She wandered the streets of Florence looking for something to take her mind off of the current situation. It never really occured to her that she'd gone out without any money or identification. Even if she had noticed, she certainly would not have turned back and gone to get either of the two.   
  
For the rest of the evening and well into the night Clarice wandered the city, enjoying and observing the nightlife. She checked her watch. 11:47 PM. It was getting late, and Clarice truly did need to find a place to stay, even if it was just for the night. "I am not going back to that house. I will not. I'd rather die on the street tonight than go back and deal-"  
  
"Clarice?" Clarice Starling recognized the voice that called her name. The voice was not that of Hannibal Lecter's.   
  
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I think that was a nice place to stop, don't you? 


End file.
